If you rely on Google news to get your daily news, you may want to be a bit more selective in which full stories you read.
Google has implemented a change that will allow some newspapers to offer only five free stories to be read per day. For more than that, you may have to register with the paper’s on-line service or, in some cases, pay a subscription fee.
The move comes in response to newspapers complaints that Google’s news reading service wasn’t giving the papers full control of their content.
“If you’re a Google user, this means that you may start to see a registration page after you’ve clicked through to more than five articles,” writes Google’s senior business product manager Josh Cohen on a Google blog.
That way, the publisher still gets its articles indexed, while at the same time, can charge for reading. The pieces will be labeled as “subscription” in Google News.
The move also comes as the publisher of the Wall Street Journal has threatened to lock down his paper’s web site and not allow access to articles via Google. Currently the Wall Street Journal is a subscription based site, but readers can see full articles via Google.
Google’s new policy might help satisfy Murdoch — but there are potential risks. Google says subscription content won’t necessarily be at the top of the search findings. “That is not a decision we make based on whether or not it’s free,” says Google. “It’s simply based on the popularity of the content with users and other sites that link to it.”
With the move and the recent announcement of streaming video for a fee Google has turned evil. Look like I’m going to be looking for a new search engine soon.
I use “Google Search” most of the time but find myself using “Bing.com” more and more for searches.
The world is in transition between printed information and cyberspace information usage. Printed newspapers are dead, the corpses are just not buried yet.
Newspapers need to all have online sites, give passwords to all paper subscribers, lock out non-subscribers, and enrich online content with animations and sections of interest to the growing internet-centric public. They need to appeal to the emerging internet-only audience.
They should look at internet content and make some of the most interesting and popular content and subjects their own. They should plan and build for a future that will be an internet only information age. Otherwise, all newspapers will suffer the fate of the Seattle P.I. and other recent newspaper closings; a dead print business and an internet business started too little, too late.
If they’re going that way, then we need an app like Hootsuite for newspapers. Something has to shift. I don’t watch TV news anymore, not local or national and definitely not the 24hr pundit fests that are being called news. I haven’t bought a newspaper to sit and read in at least 12 years.
I’ve had a NYT login since sometime in 1997, I think. I just don’t log into it to read news unless I’m looking up older stories… call it 3-4 times a year? I’ll occassionally cruise the headlines in Google News, but if I get into a news reading more, I started with the entertainment and tech news at Yahoo News and if need be, go to other news sites from there. I think Yahoo News is still the best primary starting point for me. Crippling Google News likely won’t work to anyone’s benefit, except maybe their up and coming competitors.
There are still many people out there that don’t ‘do’ news on the internet. The older folks, or the less educated/privileged. This is going to be a problem for the next 5-10 years as they are enough online readers to kill the business. Don’t forget Craigslist has destroyed a major revenue stream for them as well.
Hopefully in 5/10 years there will be some kind of widely available, wildly inexpensive kindle/nook type newspaper reader that the news papers can ‘give away’ to subscribers.
“There are still many people out there that don’t ‘do’ news on the internet. The older folks, or the less educated/privileged.” –jay
“With the move and the recent announcement of streaming video for a fee Google has turned evil. Look like I’m going to be looking for a new search engine soon.? –Jank
@Jank: So…because Google is a BUSINESS and needs to make revenue to, oh I don’t know…pay their employees/overhead and make money for shareholders…that makes them “Evil”? WTF?
So…do you work for free??? Do you live at home w/your parents and don’t have to pay rent or mortgage or for food?
Is everything you get for free? If so, lucky you, eh?
I don’t care if Google wants to make money. That doesn’t make them evil. They’re a business.
Doing \the bidding of oppressive governments like China would make Google evil as far as I’m concerned.
@jay: Hey! What’s with the pegging “old” people as those who don’t “do” the ‘net?
(And just what do you mean by “old”? Over 30? 40? 50? 60?)
I would venture to say that the majority of young people also don’t ‘do news’ on the internet…or anywhere else.
Ignorance of (local/national/international) current events is rampant amongst the under 30 set.
Find that Lady Gaga video? No problem!
Find out what’s going on in current events…anywhere? Not so much.
@ TallGrrl – Amen sista. If I made it and you want it, you pay for it.
Double Amen TallGirl.